The Norwegian online sports betting market extremely interesting. Technically, online
betting is only legal through the state-owned online sportsbook, Norsk Tipping. Legislation
brought this into effect in 2011 with the main goal of mitigating the negatives associated
with gambling such as addiction and problem gambling. While the legislation made
it illegal to use third-party online sportsbooks, the government has not yet tried
to block their IP addresses from Norwegian citizens. This has made the legislation
largely ineffectual with hundreds of sportsbook companies continuing to accept registrations
from bettors in Norway in what is still a treated as a free market.

I discuss more issues regarding Norwegian online betting on this page and throughout
this site. However, I also researched and reviewed the best sports betting sites
for Norwegians whom want to exercise choice in selecting the online sportsbook that
best meets their needs. For my research purposes, there are three sportsbook groups.
1) Disreputable ones that everyone in the world should avoid. 2) Great companies
with solid services, but fail to cater to the Norwegian market. 3) Great companies
with excellent services that also cater specially to the Norwegian customer. The
list below outlines the best of this third group. You don’t need to know the companies
in groups 1 and 2. There are hundreds in group 1, dozens in group two, but only
a few in group 3. To the right of the screen, you can read exactly how I’ve gone
about researching this topic from a Norwegian betting perspective.

How the list was created:

As general rule most sports betting review sites are built simply to present you
with as many brands as possible with logos and banners in the hopes that you will
recognise a brand that you know. Next to these logos you will likely see a 5-star
rating or a very high letter grade with no actual justification for this assessment.
These symbols only exist to encourage your play and are essentially of zero value
to you.

While most of the listed brands may be reputable, they will not actually cater very
well to the Norwegian sports bettor as many important factors will not have been
taken into account.

As you can see from my list, several of the biggest names in the Norwegian market
and names that are large within the global betting market are not listed. Unlike
other sites, I’m not interested in simply trading on a brand that you know. I want
you to play with the betting sites that I truly believe to be best for the Norwegian
bettor.

Each site must satisfy the following criteria:

Accept Norwegian player registration. This is no longer a given with all reputable
sites given the recent legislation.

Provide competitive odds on the sports that Norwegians enjoy the most.

Established companies with excellent track records of trustworthiness and fairness.

Provide an excellent user experience from both desktop and mobile devices.

Offer a wide array of banking options that are accepted within Norway.

Offer at least some free account withdrawal methods.

Provide leading edge technology for live, in-play betting in addition to other features.

I have reviewed over 30 of the World’s top sportsbook companies from the perspectives
of dozens of different national markets including the Norwegian perspective. If
any of these criteria are not sufficiently met, the reviewed sportsbook is not included
in my list. This makes your decision easier. The decision is black and white with
only four top performers.

I’m not here to list every sportsbook, tell you what is wrong with them, and then
hope to trade on their brand and logo because they have advertised and you know their
name.

I’m here to show you the best companies with which you may bet from Norway. My list
is in alphabetical order with no order of preference. They all provide an excellent
experience, but have their differences. Please read and enjoy responsibly.

BetVictor is known well in the UK for having the most competitive football odds.
If football is going to be the sport on which you will focus more than any other,
BetVictor should be at the top of your list. Read the BetVictor Norway review.

The best online sports betting sites for players in Norway

Pinnacle Sports is the world’s best reduced-juice sportsbook. This means they don’t
advertise or offer a bonus & the savings is returned to bettors with consistently
higher paying odds on all sports and offer very high limits. An amazing long term
betting partner. Read the Pinnacle Sports Norway review.

Unibet focuses heavily on the Nordic markets and provides some amazing coverage of
sports betting, especially with their coverage of niche sports like ice hockey. If
you like a breadth of sports, Unibet must be considered heavily. Read the Unibet
Norway review.

In betting with the government-run Norsk Tipping, your betting limits are much lower
as compared to free market third party options with much higher betting limits.

If you feel you have the means and the desire to bet larger amounts of money on sporting
events, you need to know which services have highest limits to ensure the sportsbook
you choose can take your action. All of the sites I list allow for big winners,
but a few of them are reserved for the bettors interested in the highest stakes.

Crucial to your sportsbook experience is the manner in which you’ll be able to deposit
and withdraw funds from your betting account via your chosen banking methods.

It is no coincidence that every sportsbook listed on this site offers Norwegian Krone
betting accounts. Similarly, you can view the most popular banking methods that
are compatible transacting Kronor or other currencies of your choice as a Norwegian
customer.

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How do these betting sites compare to government-run Norsk Tipping?

There are several key differences that make third-party sports betting sites superior
to Norsk Tipping.

2) More betting markets - the companies listed above provide comprehensive sports
betting coverage in terms of all the ways you may bet on sports. For example, for
an English Premier League game, you might have over 100 different ways to bet on
the match or on player performances within the match, not simply match results.

3) Government Tracking - When you sign up with Norsk Tipping, you must use your identity
from the Central Population Register known as in Norwegian as Det Sentrale Folkeregister
(DSF). So your activity and your winnings will all certainly be tracked. When you
bet with a third party sportsbook, you can fund your account in Norwegian Krone through
numerous banking methods that the government has little or no access for tracking.
If you prefer the government have no knowledge of your activities, choose a third-party
sportsbook.

4) Limits on wagers - Related to point 4, Norsk Tipping may limit your ability to
place wagers at the level you wish to bet. If you want to bet larger amounts of
money, this is far simpler with all of my listed sportsbooks with several of them
having some of the highest betting limits in the world for any betting company, let
alone the Norway market.

The future of online sports betting in Norway: How will it look?

It appears as though the government will be looking at trying to block IP addresses
of third-party sportsbook companies in the near future. This can be viewed as full
prohibition of private online sports betting in Norway. History has told us that
if a citizenry wants access to a so-called ‘vice’, they will find a way to access
the vice.

Prohibition of alcohol was enacted in the US in the 1920s. With prohibition, organised
crime was given an very large opportunity to profit heavily, and they did so by smuggling
Illegal alcohol from Canada into illegal bars and speakeasies. This caused a very
large loss in the tax revenues that would have been realised by the government had
the alcohol been allowed to be imported normally. While other countries have also
taken moral stances on online gambling, as in the American example regarding alcohol,
there is a very large hole in the system. Although the government may attempt to
block the IP addresses of certain betting company websites for their citizens, people
that are interested in having freedom of choice simply use software that allows them
to essentially bypass this blocking process by altering their own IP address. This
is a common practice by people that wish to access content intended for a certain
region.

The Government of Norway has set toward this potential goal of prohibition due to
a worry over ‘problem gamblers.’ The large majority of bettors in Norway are not
problem gamblers and thus the vast majority are essentially being punished and having
their freedom of choice limited by concerns surrounding around 1% to 2% of gamblers.
This is certainly not fair practise in a democratic country. Especially since all
the most reputable sports betting websites in the world including those listed above,
all offer self-exclusion programs so that people with addiction issues may limit
themselves through self-nomination to each company.

Should the freedom of choice for the many be limited or extinguished all-together
due to the weaknesses of the few? This is an answer for the people of Norway to
discuss with their politicians. Currently, there are better ways to bet than with
the state-owned company, with better odds, Norwegian Krone betting accounts and even
with websites set in the Norwegian language, thus Norwegians will continue to look
for ways to exercise their freedom of choice which will result in the loss of revenue
to the government and potential problem gamblers will fall through the cracks of
the system Norway is currently using.

Perhaps Norway should look at the model of Australia where reputable third party
companies like those listed above have been licensed by the government to create
special Australian-facing sports betting solutions. Australia has the most problem-gambling
in the developed world. The Australian government may continue to tax sportsbooks
rather than the bettors, and Australian bettors get excellent selection of service
providers because each licensed service is tailored to the Australian market in terms
of accepted banking options, Australian Dollar accounts, competitive odds pricing
and attractive bonus offers. The companies may also ensure that irregular betting
patterns by customers may be monitored to help combat problem-gambling.

This kind of solution ensures the wider market has more choice while the small percentage
with addiction issues may be helped and is surely a more democratic solution than
a government-imposed monopoly. Currently only China is blocking gambling IP addresses.
Even Muslim countries where gambling is illegal through religious law have not blocked
these sites. Is Norway’s government considering a strategy in line with the Chinese
and less freedom than those in the Middle East? Voice your concerns with your own
political representatives.